In 1994, this film-maker Lee Tamahori made one of the biggest first films of the decade, operating at full capacity with the heartbreaking social-realist drama Once Were Warriors. This family represent a working-class Maori household in South Auckland: the actor is the drinking, brawling, bragging alpha-male welfare claimant Jake, who comes home from pub visits with his weak followers to intimidate and abuse his wife Beth, portrayed by the actress, and their kids. He shows no concern to the future of his older boys who have drifted into gangland culture and illegal activities, including his gentle daughter the girl, who shows promise as a writer. A son receives gang tattoos; another is sent to a youth detention where he is partly educated in the traditions of indigenous heritage – the haka and the taiaha warrior spear – and learns dignity and self-respect. Meanwhile at Jake’s chaotic house, Grace is raped by Jake’s grotesque friend “Bully”; tragedy ensues, and Beth passionately confronts the despicable Jake: “Our ancestors used to be fighters, but in contrast to you, they, they were people with mana, dignity; soulful beings …”
Emotional Violence and Confident Direction
Tamahori unleashed with such intense drama, and landed sledgehammer punches with bar sequences, domestic moments and the gang ritual initiation scenes, directing them with confidence and verve. He crafted a gutsy, heartfelt film with a very 90s touch of brash and trash. It succeeded with audiences and reviewers, and – for good or ill – strongly influenced studio heads in the film industry who could see how Tamahori could bring that dynamism and talent to commercial projects.
Hollywood Career and Diverse Work
In America, Tamahori made the dark mystery Mulholland Falls, about violent LAPD cops who care nothing for protocol, and then the David Mamet-scripted survival thriller The Bear with the actor and Alec Baldwin as two men who trek through the wilderness after a plane crash. (This film became a cult favorite when its producer he wrote humorously about the turbulent production of shooting with a trained bear in his droll tinseltown memoir What Just Happened?) Along Came a Spider was a serviceable thriller, and he earned again directing the sequel in the triple-X franchise XXX State of the Union.
Bond Film and Professional Changes
Yet the peak, or maybe the nadir, of Lee Tamahori’s American work was taking on the Bond movie Die Another Day in 2002, with Pierce Brosnan; this was the Bond film mocked for having the poorest device in the series – the invisible car. What is the point an invisible car, viewers asked? It was a vehicle which makes it very hard to remember its parking spot.
Subsequent Projects and Return
After this, Tamahori found renewed creativity. His The Devil’s Double in 2011 featured the actor in the twin roles of the dictator's brutal offspring the character and as well as his body double, employed to shield the young tyrant-princeling from attack or kidnapping: this was a forceful, engaging movie which sidestepped the usual doppelganger cliches. In subsequent times, he went back to the subject of indigenous traditions, directing The Convert in 2023, working with writer his partner. He proved to be an outstanding director – but it was his first film, the emotional Once Were Warriors, that was his greatest work.
